The Best of Wedding Photography.pdf - Free

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Interaction. Great wedding photographers can make anyone look good, but their real gift is that ability to create the animated, filled-with-life portrait. It is the best of both worlds—the real and the idealized. Certainly part of the success is good direction, but the less tangible ingredient is the interaction—the bringing out of the person who’s alive and well in there. It’s interaction and communication, but also a little magic. PROACTIVE VS. REACTIVE Traditional wedding coverage would feature dozens of posed pictures pulled from a “shot list.” Such shot lists were passed down by generations of other traditional wedding photographers. There may have been as many as 75 scripted shots—from cutting the cake, to tossing the garter, to the father of the bride walking his daughter down the aisle. In addition to the scripted moments, traditional photographers fill in the album with “candids,” many of which are staged or at least made when the subjects were aware of the camera. The contemporary wedding photographer’s approach is quite different. Instead of being a part of every event, moving people around, and staging the action, the photographer tends to be quietly invisible, choosing to fade into the background so the subjects are not aware of the photographer’s presence. The photographer does not want to intrude on the scene, instead, documenting it from a distance with the use of longer-than-normal lenses and, usually, without flash. Because one can change ISOs instantly on digital cameras, the medium offers a completely self-contained means of documenting a wedding unobserved. POWERS OF OBSERVATION Like any form of reportage, whether one is a news photographer, a fashion photographer, or a sports photographer, one of the prerequisites to success is the skill of observation—an intense power to concentrate on the events occurring right in front of you. Through keen observation, a skill set that can be clearly enhanced through practice, Anticipation and observation are directly linked. The more a photographer concentrates on the events before him, the greater the ability to capture minute moments from within that action with clarity and crispness. Joe Buissink had been observing this young girl’s fantasy and assumed correctly a magical moment was about to happen. THE WEDDING PHOTOGRAPHER’S MINDSET 19
ABOVE—The photographer must be alert to nuances in the scenes he sees. Here, David Beckstead caught the church doors about to be opened by the new bride and groom. The bright sunlight outside seems ready to burst onto this couple’s lives, a symbolic moment captured from the tapestry of the day’s events. RIGHT—Deanna Urs knew that this bride would spend some last-minute time with her long-time pal, so the photographer waited for the right moment. With a sun-filled room, Deanna fired a flash from camera position, set to a stop less than the available light reading, to fill in the shadows but preserve the ambient room light. the photographer begins to develop the knack of predicting what will happen next. The skill of knowing what comes next is partially due to knowing the intricacies of the event and the order in which events will occur. It is also a result of experience; the more weddings one photographs, the more accustomed one becomes to their rhythm and flow. The sense of anticipation, however, is also a function of clearly seeing what is transpiring in front of you and reacting to it quickly. 20 THE BEST OF WEDDING PHOTOGRAPHY PREPARATION Knowing what course events will take is also a function of having done your homework—visiting with the banquet manager, caterer, florist, band director, and so on. This is all part of the basic preparation, and the more the photographer knows of the scheduled events and their order, the better he or she can be at predetermining the best ways to cover those events. This kind of detailed information will aid in not only being prepared for what’s to come, but it will provide a game plan and specifics for where to best photograph each of the day’s events. From such information the photographer will be able to choreograph his or her own movements to be in the optimum position for
Page 1: WEDDING The Best of PHOTOGRAPHY Amh
Page 4 and 5: INTRODUCTION . . . . . . . . . . .
Page 6 and 7: T his is the third edition of The B
Page 8 and 9: 1. THE EVOLUTION OF WEDDING PHOTOGR
Page 11 and 12: WEDDING PHOTOJOURNALISM: A MODIFIED
Page 13 and 14: things happen spontaneously and use
Page 15: 2. THE WEDDING PHOTOGRAPHER’S MIN
Page 19: Joe Buissink has been known to work
Page 23 and 24: LEFT—Greg Gibson has a finely hon
Page 25 and 26: Michael Schuhmann created this wond
Page 27 and 28: The slower the film speed or digita
Page 29 and 30: of four or five areas of the viewfi
Page 31 and 32: 30 THE BEST OF WEDDING PHOTOGRAPHY
Page 33 and 34: ity or file size, it does affect le
Page 35 and 36: From outside the reception, Jerry D
Page 37 and 38: flash. Falloff is less than with ot
Page 39 and 40: 4. CAMERA TECHNIQUE Whether you’v
Page 41 and 42: TOP—J.B. Sallee used a 70mm lens
Page 43 and 44: TOP—With a 17mm lens on his D1X,
Page 45 and 46: LEFT—A tricky exposure situation
Page 47 and 48: Since most wedding photographers op
Page 49 and 50: This is a beautiful pose created by
Page 51 and 52: LEFT—Marcus Bell created this han
Page 53 and 54: Tom Muñoz has a great deal of resp
Page 55 and 56: LEFT—There is something special a
Page 57 and 58: form the pattern. They are used to
Page 59 and 60: Marcus Bell is brilliant at posing
Page 61 and 62: On location, sometimes you can find
Page 63: LEFT—The natural lighting pattern
Page 66 and 67: from the camera lens. It is a drama
Page 68 and 69: ecommended unless your only concern
Page 70:
Backlighting with direct sunlight c
Page 73 and 74:
TOP—David Worthington created thi
Page 75:
ABOVE—Melanie Nashan captured the
Page 79 and 80:
Metering and Exposure. Here is how
Page 81 and 82:
Al Gordon is a virtuoso of flash fi
Page 83 and 84:
the light, you’ll find that it is
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BUILD A GOOD RELATIONSHIP Alisha an
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his best man. Bridesmaids will arri
Page 90 and 91:
As part of the wedding photography,
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LEFT—Working as a pair or trio of
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What couple would not be thrilled w
Page 97 and 98:
LEFT—Joe Photo always makes it a
Page 99 and 100:
10. HELPFUL TIPS The following is a
Page 102 and 103:
THE BOUQUET Make sure a large bouqu
Page 105 and 106:
REMEMBERING NAMES Photographer Fran
Page 107 and 108:
11. PROOFING AND PRINTING T here ar
Page 109 and 110:
ABOVE—Very few truly romantic ima
Page 111 and 112:
Learning to recognize shapes as pag
Page 113 and 114:
Three very simple images and a bold
Page 115 and 116:
album-page layouts in Photoshop. Th
Page 117 and 118:
Dream a Little. With digital, we ha
Page 119 and 120:
David Williams brings sophisticatio
Page 121 and 122:
THE PHOTOGRAPHERS T o illustrate th
Page 123 and 124:
Charles and Jennifer Maring—Charl
Page 125 and 126:
INDEX A Albums, 109-18 design princ
Page 127 and 128:
Also by Bill Hurter . . . OTHER BOO
Page 129:
Joe Buissink Ron Capobianco Anthony
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